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Comment by Swizec | Hacker News Reader

Wonderful article and a fantastic example of how there’s a big gap between being fluent in English and being fluent in English, especially the English that your counter-party is using.

Took me forever to get used to California English after I moved here from the slavic part of Europe. Still find a lot of it utterly boneheaded, but at least I know what’s going on and can cope … at great cost to personal sanity.

It will never not irk me when people say ”Please feel free to X” when they mean ”It is paramount that you do X”

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Do you have some examples of the language seeming boneheaded? Sounds interesting.

Race condition, just edited :)

> It will never not irk me when people say ”Please feel free to X” when they mean ”It is paramount that you do X”

Another big one is when people say “Not my favorite”, but mean “I hate this”.

And a cause of great confusion in the workplace: “Can we do X?” meaning “You should do X, I am delegating this task to you”

And then there’s the whole genre of “corporate speak” memes like what “Per my last email” really means.

On a more personal note, the California Yes is super frustrating when making plans with people. Just because someone said Yes, does not mean they have any intention of actually showing up. They might get a headache an hour or so before the planned meeting time. Headaches are very popular in California it seems.

> On a more personal note, the California Yes is super frustrating when making plans with people. Just because someone said Yes, does not mean they have any intention of actually showing up. They might get a headache an hour or so before the planned meeting time. Headaches are very popular in California it seems.

The Californian 'Yes' sounds like the Japan one.

British understatement gets me in trouble when communicating with americans. In the British to American dictionary, 'I would prefer not' becomes 'I wont'.

I realised that “It’s okay” can have three very different meanings:

“It’s okay!” => (reassuringly), it’s fine, perhaps even great.

“It’s okay” => (honestly), it’s neither good nor bad.

“It’s okay” => (politely) This is terrible.

For some reason non-native speakers and the occasional yank have problems with this.

> For some reason non-native speakers

Here's where it gets even better as a slavic person – when I say "This is okay, but have you thought about flaws A, B, and C?" it means that your idea is so good that it's worthy of critique. To an American it sounds like I just started a scorched earth campaign against their ego.

Huh. I wouldn't take it that way (depending on tone of voice). I would not quite take it as "it's good enough to criticize", either. I would take it as my idea was neutral, and here are some flaws, which if I could fix them might turn it into a good idea.

"Would you like to donate to [x cause] today?"

"That's okay" => No.

> British understatement gets me in trouble when communicating with americans. In the British to American dictionary, 'I would prefer not' becomes 'I wont'.

It seems quite a few of the Americans you speak to haven't read Melville's "Bartleby". You'll not find a more emphatic, "I would prefer not" in literature.

In geek terms, the Japanese hai is not "yes", it's "ack": it's an acknowledgement that your message has been received, not validation that the receiver agrees with it, much less intends to do anything about it.

I have found the Japanese “ok” more confusing than hai, since its an English word used slightly differently. I have tried to explain to Japanese people that the English “ok” is like a minimal agreement not showing any great enthusiasm, but because it has a neutral or even positive nuance they keep using it in English in situations where it makes it sound like they are reluctantly agreeing.

I thought it was called the California No? "Oh ya totally let's hang out!!" (you're never gonna hang out)

I've lived in LA for over 25 years. I think part of the reason things are like this is that the sheer amount of people here make it hard to know if you are dealing with a person who is going to end up being a nut or not. This town is also full of narcissists and leeches who want to use you. I've let people into my life that I seriously regretted later. After enough of those you start getting more cagey. It's a shame really. Whenever I go somewhere else I am reminded how much more genuine people can be and how I need to be more mindful of what I say. Words hold a lot more power outside of the LA bubble. In a funny way we are much more like the British in this way.

For example, locals know not to make eye contact while out and about. Not because we are dicks, but because if you happen to lock eyes with someone, theres a non zero chance they're gonna attack you or ask you for money etc. Take a ride on public transit if you don't believe me.

> For example, locals know not to make eye contact while out and about

I believe this is a city thing. We have the same back home in Ljubljana.

The social contract in cities seems to be one of politely ignoring each others’ existence.

My theory. The social contract varies in proportion with the available resources.

In cities the friendliness is missing because you don't need to rely on others for food/water or anything else, you can just purchase it nearby.

When resources run out that's where the social contract becomes more social.

Camping trip and need a match to start your campfire? Your neighbor will happily chat with you.

Power outage. People on the street become way more friendly.

Transit failure. People are more likely to help arrange transport or chat as they wait.

Snowstorm snowed you in. That's how you meet the new neighbors who are also out shovelling.

I sort of interpreted it an inverse way:

In a city, the limited resources are emotional/social energy, sense of privacy, etc. So the social contract is to conserve them by politely not noticing each other; thereby allowing people to maintain the reserves necessary to get through the day.

As someone who has lived in London for a long time and spent a lot of time in NYC, no eye contact (especially on public transport) is a hard and fast "big city quality-of-life" rule. If someone makes eye contact with me on public transport they are almost always crazy, intoxicated or some kind of tourist/visitor.

These are good observations on how to deal with managers and acquaintances. It’s more rewarding to invest your energy in close friends and family, although this doesn’t always come easily if you’ve recently moved to a new place.

Other examples that I have found difficult

1) My wife (native English), when she is asking me to do something , always says "Would you like to...?" eg "Would you like to do the dishes?" To which, the answer for me (English first language, but born and raised in Africa) is "No", because these sorts of chores are things I do in spite of not wanting to do them because I know they are necessary. I've since learned that I actually would like to do the dishes in those cases and perhaps just don't realise.

2) A lot of time when I am leading a team or giving instructions, people from certain cultures get confused because I always ask with the word "Please" eg "Please could you get this analysis to me by close of business so I can work on it tomorrow morning while you're sleeping?". For me that is a very specific and clear instruction, but in some cultures it seems if something is asked with a "please" that means it's a favour rather than an instruction, so will lead to mixed results until we get used to each other.

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